London lawyer jailed in US for share sting

FORMER London lawyer Andrew Warren has been jailed in New York for his part in an international shares scam that involved laundering money for organised crime connected to stockbrokers.

Victims of the sting included the late Duke of Athol, Sir Anthony Pilkington and several prominent British families.

Warren pleaded guilty to falsifying company records. He was sentenced to between 20 months and five years' imprisonment by a New York state judge after a plea bargain following his extradition from Britain last April.

Warren, 57, who was extradited after a three-year legal battle, had resisted being sent to the United States, claiming he was unfit to be tried due to severe depression.

Since his arrival in New York, Warren has been held in the prison wing of the city's Belle View Hospital. The former partner in the defunct Mayfair law firm of Talbot Creggy spoke during the brief hearing only to ask whether he would be paroled next February.

His ex-partner, Stuart Creggy, was convicted in New York last November for his part in the share fraud. In February, he was fined $6,000 (£3,700) and put on probation for five years as well as being ordered to do community service.

Between 1992 and 1995, Warren set up and managed 19 offshore companies for New York stockbrokers George Carhart and Sal Mazzeo of Westfield Financial Services. Westfield manipulated the unregistered shares of more than 50 small listed companies. Some 50 British investors lost about £500,000 each. The offshore companies, run from Jersey, hid Westfield's interests and laundered money for the firm and its clients.

When UK and US authorities investigated, Warren and Creggy produced a Liberian diplomat to claim he was the owner of the offshore company.